


raven's refreshing potions

by akabrokenarrow



Category: Tales of Vesperia
Genre: Drugs, Humor, M/M, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-19
Updated: 2020-05-19
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:02:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24277822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akabrokenarrow/pseuds/akabrokenarrow
Summary: “Why don’t we sell some of the potions Raven’s always making?” Karol yelled, feet spread apart and hands on his hips. He looked like he was halfway to teetering off the log he was sitting on.  “People are always looking for stuff like that!”“Potions?” Raven stuttered. “Wait, d’ya mean…”He, Yuri, and Judith all looked down at It. Their shared glass appendage that they partook in once the kids were asleep. The one that was currently in Raven’s hand, always at his side. And most importantly, the one that was always filled with liquid.Their bong water.---Or: Brave Vesperia is running low on money, and need a get-rich-quick scheme to bolster their pockets.
Relationships: Yuri Lowell/Flynn Scifo
Comments: 9
Kudos: 35





	raven's refreshing potions

**Author's Note:**

> Note: this fic does have spoilers for the main plot. If you've only just started the game, and want to avoid spoilers, I suggest holding off on this one!
> 
> 13/06/20: Edited a minor, yet confusing, typo

On a warm, fateful evening, Brave Vesperia was all huddled around a small fire, already having set up camp for the night. They had spent the past few weeks on some dead-end job that had them going from continent to continent. After twelve hours of hunting for some monster that might not even exist, Raven was overjoyed to finally get to rest his muscles. Repede chewed on his homemade dog food as Yuri prepared sandwiches for the fifth day in a row. 

“If I have to eat another sandwich again, I’m going to kill myself,” Rita huffed as she watched Yuri carefully slide an egg onto hers. Raven couldn’t blame her, really. His stomach churned thinking about the rock hard bread he had chewed on for breakfast. 

“Well, we’re kind of low on funds,” Yuri said. “So unless you have any ideas…” 

Estelle, who was nestled close beside Rita, put her hand to her chin in thought. “Maybe we can try getting some passive income.” 

“How?” Yuri said. 

“By selling something, perhaps?” 

Now even Raven had his thinking cap on. The passive income idea wasn’t half bad (and Raven would rather hold off on the sandwiches for a while), but what exactly could they sell? It wasn’t like they had any sort of product to offer, and Raven was not selling his--

“Why don’t we sell some of the potions Raven’s always making?” Karol yelled, feet spread apart and hands on his hips. He looked like he was halfway to teetering off the log he was sitting on. “People are always looking for stuff like that!” 

“Potions?” Raven stuttered. “Wait, d’ya mean…” 

He, Yuri, and Judith all looked down at It. Their shared glass appendage that they partook in once the kids were asleep. The one that was currently in Raven’s hand, always at his side. And most importantly, the one that was always filled with liquid.

Their bong water.

Before Raven could finish his sentence, Yuri interrupted him by clearing his throat. “Oh yeah, Raven, your potions! Great idea, Captain Karol.” 

Judith’s face twisted into the biggest shit-eating grin he had ever seen. “I heard they’re filled with herbs and nutrients!” 

Raven scowled at the both of them. “C’mon guys,” he moaned, “I really doubt that anyone would want to buy my...potions.” 

“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Judith said. “Your potions are great! Aren’t they, Yuri?” 

“Yeah,” said Yuri, whose face was so contorted from trying to hold in his laughter that he looked like he was going to explode. “I think you’ve got some--something really good going on there, old man.” 

“So, do we all agree as a guild to try to sell some potions?” Karol said. 

Rita crossed her arms. “I think it’s stupid. No one’s gonna want to buy some stupid watery potion that probably can’t even cure anything.” And just then, Raven saw it. 

He saw all of the piles of gald they could have. They could buy new weapons, sleep in inns, and even eat something different to eat every night. It was like a dream come true. And as the piles turned into mountains, glistening like the golden sand beneath them, Raven, quite possibly, stumbled upon the greatest idea of his life, including illegally collecting his Imperial Knights pension. 

“I know where they’ll want it,” Raven said. 

Estelle leaned forward. “Where?” 

Raven smirked. “The desert, of course.”

\---

A week later, they already had a stall set up outside of Mantaic. Patty had painted a sign for them which said ‘RAVEN’S REFRESHING POTIONS HERE!’. Yuri mostly spent the days in town with one more button loose to convince people to buy their potions, along with Judith. Karol and Estelle manned the stall, while Rita and Raven spent their days in what they called ‘R and D’. It had taken Rita less than a second into ‘product development’ to realize what was really going on. “You’d better smoke outside so you don’t make my clothes smelly, old man,” she said. “And try out that new strain I’m growing for you next time.” 

Rita, in all of her tiny, prodigal glory, had already started up an effective grow-op, complete with blastia lamps and a shower system. She and Raven knew that they could make an absolute killing out of selling it, if Estelle wasn’t so against it. Instead, Raven would smoke a little during the day to get some back-up servings of bong water in case Karol and Estelle ran out. And every night, he, Yuri, and Judith were getting absolutely blasted. The potions business really wasn’t half bad. 

As time passed, they got more and more customers, usually mercenaries or other guild types who were planning on crossing the Sands of Kogorh. Since they were always so thirsty anyway, they never complained about the ashy taste, or the ‘burnt notes’ as Raven liked to call them. And there was no man on earth who could turn down Estelle’s beaming smile. 

They eventually started hiring some locals in town to take care of the stand while they left to go do jobs for the guild. The skeleton crew always got a fair share of the profits, but they had one rule: never, ever go into Rita’s makeshift laboratory. Brave Vesperia would provide stock of them, of course, and the nights before they left on a mission were always the best ones. Rita’s stuff was strong, and Raven would go to sleep with a big smile on his face and his brain feeling like mush. It was when the word started to really get out that there was trouble. 

One day, Raven was making a delivery of some extra bottles to Karol and Estelle’s stall, which had already run out. It was ten in the morning. There was a line so long that stretched all the way back to the Weasand of Cados, full of people who wanted a taste of the ‘miracle potion’. 

“Oh no,” Raven said. 

Just then, a beautiful woman turned to him and grabbed his arm. “Excuse me? Are you Raven? The one who makes the potions?” 

Raven stood up straighter than usual, put down his load of bottles, and gently put a hand onto her shoulder. “That I am, miss. Raven the Great, at your service.” 

She giggled. “I came all the way from Zaphias to try your potions! I’ve heard they’re just amazing for your skin.” 

“You--you came from where?” 

“From Zaphias,” she repeated. “Don’t you know? The whole noble quarter is talking about you!” 

“About ME?” Oh, now this was bad. He was supposed to be dead, for God’s sake! “You know what, why don’t you take all of those bottles for your family, free of charge! I gotta go.” He spun on his heel, almost tripping face first into the scorching sand as he rushed back towards Mantaic to find Yuri on the street. He found him frowning among droves of the well dressed denizens from Zaphias’ noble quarter, who had all come out to try the bong water. 

“Hey, boss, I need to talk to ya for a minute,” Raven said, huffing and puffing. 

“Shoot,” Yuri said, “I’m all ears.” 

Raven grabbed his sleeve and dragged him all the way back to their headquarters. “How much money have we made from this little scheme, anyway?” 

“Oh, I dunno.” Yuri shrugged. “I guess about, like...10 million gald?” 

“TEN MILLION?!” Raven yelped. “Are you fucking with me right now? Ten million? Isn’t it about time to give it up? I mean, we could have sandwiches for life with that kinda money!” 

“But Raven, I’m waiting to be able to go back to the lower quarter to give everyone there that money,” Yuri said. “Also, we get to smoke all of Rita’s awesome weed at night and get totally blazed! Our life here is awesome! And those noble quarter pigs don’t even know what they’re getting. It’s the ultimate wealth redistribution system.” 

“Sure, but ya know that things like these never last.” Unless they wanted to rebrand into a marijuana-focused guild, which would be impossible, since Ioder illegalized it. And in any case, Fortune’s Market had such a large stake that anything successful was eventually snatched up by them. “‘Sides, I thought we were just doin’ this until we could get a couple of guild jobs.” 

“Screw the guild jobs, this pays way better,” Yuri said. “We could kill one thousand monsters and it wouldn’t even compare to our bong water profits.” 

Just for a moment, Raven’s face turned deathly serious, a glimpse of himself from ten years ago peaking out. He shook his head. “Don’t say I didn’t warn ya, kid.” 

\---

“Hey, old man! Wake up!” 

Raven groaned in his pillow. “What time is it?” There was no light trying to creep beyond his eyelids, and he was still completely sprawled out on his cotton sheets. 

“The knights are coming,” Yuri hissed.

“The--the WHO?” Raven shot up in an instant. 

“We have to destroy everything,” Yuri said. “Rita’s already at the lab. Let’s go.” Not even changing out of his pajamas, Raven rushed there in the cool desert night, the sand getting between his toes. Rita was already casting fireball after fireball once they got there,the fruit of their labour going up in smoke. 

“You guys have to get rid of the bottles as fast as possible,” Rita gasped. “They’re already coming.” 

Raven grabbed as many bottles as he could carry as he ran away from the toxic fumes. He ran out into the city, and straight to the oasis in the middle of it.

“Yuri, let’s dump ‘em here,” Raven said. “It’s all just water anyway.” 

“Yeah,” Yuri said. And then they both threw their respective armfulls into the water. Thankfully, there weren’t many bottles left in the first place, so it didn’t take long until they could spare a moment to catch their breaths. 

“I grabbed this from Rita’s lab,” Yuri said. “It’s the last nug.” 

Raven wanted to cry looking at it. Never before had he smoked weed so potent, that went down so smooth and was so fresh. “So long to the good old days,” Raven said. And with that, he got out his rolling papers as Yuri grinded it up. 

\---

They had gone back to the inn, after that, but barely anyone could sleep. All they could think about was the knights’ impending arrival, and also, their now complete lack of air conditioning. 

“What are we gonna do, Yuri,” Karol asked as they all lay in bed, looking up at the ceiling. “We were just selling potions, weren’t we?” 

Yuri sighed. “Well, what we did was more like scamming.” 

“But they were legitimate potions, weren’t they?” 

“They were a bit more...watery than the ones you get at the merchant’s,” Raven said. 

“That doesn’t make them bad, though! We were just trying to help people!” 

“Ya see, Karol, these potions had a secret ingredient.” 

“A secret ingredient? But, how?” 

“It’s something that’s only for adults,” Yuri said. 

“Woof,” Repede barked. 

“Okay, fine,” Karol whined. “The knights better not give us a hard time tomorrow,” he grumbled into his pillow. 

“Ya can say that again,” Raven said as he closed his eyes and waited for the night to pass. 

\---

Raven, to his surprise, found no one else in the room when he woke up. The sun was already blazing in. “Oh crap,” he said to himself as he gave himself a quick sponge bath and changed into a fresh pair of clothes. He raced outside, and saw Yuri talking to--

Oh no.

The Flynn brigade was here. And there was no way Yuri could get away with lying to Flynn. He crept up to them, trying to listen in so he could get a feel for the situation. 

“Potions? We’re just here on a few guild jobs,” Yuri was saying, but the look on Flynn’s face didn’t seem totally convinced. Raven would have to do something. 

He walked up to Yuri, put an arm around his shoulder, and said, “Oh Yuri, ya don’t have to lie to him!” He turned to face Flynn directly. “We’re on our honeymoon!” 

Before Flynn could even react, Yuri elbowed Raven hard in the stomach. “We are  
absolutely not on our honeymoon,” Yuri said. 

Flynn laughed. “Well, that’s good to hear, at least.” The relief in his voice told Raven that his plan had worked, and Flynn and Yuri continued to talk as Raven soaked up the sun. 

Suddenly, a voice came from behind them. “Captain!” Sodia called, racing up to them. “We’ve found a piece of evidence near the oasis. Witcher’s analyzing it now to see if it had any illegal specimens.” 

“Great work, Sodia,” Flynn said. “I’ll see you later, Yuri, Sir Raven.” And with that, he left with a wave. 

Yuri and Raven stood there, completely aghast. “We are so fucked,” Yuri said. 

\---

The knights continued looking for evidence of illegal drug smuggling through ‘potions’ for another week and a half. They searched the whole oasis, digging out as many bottles as they could find. But they had no one to link the crime to. All of the nobles had already gone back to Zaphias, exhausted from the heat. And with the lab burned, there was simply no other evidence. 

“Hey,” Flynn said while walking up to Raven, Yuri, and Judith, who were all enjoying a nightly smoke near the oasis. It was a beautiful night; the stars were all out and the moon shined brightly above them. “We’re heading back to Zaphias tomorrow.” He settled in beside Yuri. “I thought I should say goodbye.” 

Raven and Judith made kissing noises as Yuri turned bright red. “Already? That’s too bad.” They were so preoccupied with teasing him that they didn’t notice Yuri reach for the bong and pass it to Flynn. “Want one last hit?” 

“Huh? What is this?” Flynn said, holding the bong in his hand. “Wait--” His eyes shot up and he looked at Yuri. “This is--” 

“That’s just water, baby!” Raven said quickly, trying to save the team. 

“No, Flynn said. “This is--YOU!” And then Flynn was getting out his sword and Yuri was standing up and Raven supposed that they were gonna do that weird kind of foreplay that they usually did, but this was way more serious. Yuri wasn’t holding back his punches and neither was Flynn. “You were the ones selling the bong water!” 

“You knew what it was?!” Yuri guffawed. 

“Of course I knew what it was, I’m the freakin’ Commandant! Why wouldn’t I know what it was?” Flynn screeched. “And besides, we had Witcher run a sample--” 

“Ohhh, I see. Apple Head ran a sample.” Yuri smirked as he lunged forward to catch Flynn in a flurry of slashes, but he was too high. He ended up falling right on his ass instead. If it wasn’t so dire, Raven would have laughed.

“Yuri Lowell, and the rest of Brave Vesperia, you’re under arrest for illegally selling drug-related products to the general public,” Flynn declared. 

\---

It was interesting, Raven thought, how he had been in jail multiple times, yet it still never managed to get better. The amenities were always the same, and the water that dripped on you was still cold and smelly. The irony of it all. 

Karol was already fast asleep, so it was just Yuri and Raven who were awake in the men’s cell. When they had a little bit of light, they could count the stones on the walls or do something else just as mundane. But now, they only had each other. 

“If I sucked his dick, do you think he’d release us?” Yuri said.

“Who? The prison guard?” Raven said, a little aghast. 

“No, stupid. I mean Flynn.” 

Raven sighed. He should have expected that one. “Haven’t ya tried that already? Besides, where can ya even blow him?” 

“Oh trust me, I remember lots of places.” 

“Can you go be disgusting somewhere else?” Rita called from the other side of the wall. “Estelle can hear you.” 

“Sorry Estelle, thought you were sleeping,” Yuri called back. 

“Why is she in jail, anyway? She’s the princess,” Rita said. 

“I was helping Karol at the stall, remember?” Estelle said. “That makes me complicit, too.” 

“Yeah, but--” 

“Ah, c’mon, let’s just make the best of it,” Raven said. “Actually, this is where me and Yuri here first met!” 

“Ew,” Rita said. 

“Hey, it’s a touching story!” 

“It’s really not,” Yuri said. “Can we please go back to trying to get out of here?” 

“My butt hurts,” Judith whined. 

“Don’t worry, everyone,” Raven said. “I’ll come up with something.” 

\---

Flynn came by to see them a few days later. By then, Raven and Yuri had collectively counted all of the stones in the cell twice over. It was nice seeing a new face that wasn’t hidden behind a helmet, Raven thought.

“We’re going to need you to testify in the trial,” Flynn said. “I--I’m sure they will find a way to lighten your sentence.” 

“I’m not testifying to anyone,” Yuri said.

“We were just selling water,” Karol said. 

Raven stood up. “I will take full responsibility.” 

Everyone turned to face him, even the girls who could only tell where he was from the sound of his voice. Flynn gasped. 

“Ya can’t prosecute a dead man, right? And they weren’t just potions.” Raven paused. “They were...they were Raven’s potions. Raven’s artisanal bong water.” 

Flynn sighed. “Fine. You’re right, we can’t arrest a dead man.” He buried his head in his hands. “You’re free to go. But I’m coming along with you.”

“What?” Yuri said. “Are you serious?” 

“Someone has to watch over you,” Flynn said.

“But you’re the Commandant,” Yuri said. “You can’t just leave whenever you want!” 

“I can’t believe that worked,” Raven said. 

“Actually, Ioder insisted. He wants any other, um, ‘potion sellers’ to be taken care of. As you have experience in the industry, you’d be a valuable asset to the mission. You’re free to go,” Flynn said, reaching for the keys and unlocking both cells. “Congratulations.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Judith said as she strolled casually out of prison. 

“What about me?” Estelle said. 

“Well, the council probably won’t let you on the throne anytime soon thanks to this, but you should be safe in Halure,” Flynn said. 

“All right,” Yuri said as they finally exited the castle. We’ve got a new job to do, on behalf of the Commandant. Let’s roll out.” 

\---

Flynn sat in a circle, as they were huddled around a small fire. Yuri was cutting into a stale loaf of bread, preparing their dinner. 

“Why can’t we have nicer food again?’ Rita said.

“Because the Knights took all our money,” Yuri said. 

And so, as he ate his fifth sandwich in a row, Flynn turned to Raven, and he saw it. .Oh yes, he saw it…all those mountains of gald...

“Don’t even think about it,” Raven said.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to:  
> -The person on Twitter whose DN is 'raven vesperia bong water'. Without you, I never would have written this in a weed-fueled quarantine haze.  
> -To my bong.  
> -To you, for reading!


End file.
